Tears smart my eyes and I whirl away from him. There’s no way I’m giving him the satisfaction of seeing me cry. He doesn’t deserve my tears, but that’s the thing about a broken heart, the person that deserves it is never the one who gets theirs broken. “I don’t think I need to hear an explanation. I think the message was pretty clear. You can’t explain saying I love you to another woman.”
“If you think that, that proves how wrong you are.” Strong hands grip my wrist and he spins me toward him before I can pull away. “I can explain.”
“Don’t let me stop you.” I yank myself free and cross my arms over my chest. Pasting on my best poker face, I do my best to look unimpressed even though I can’t ignore the tingling that lingers where he touched me. I can’t trust myself around him any more than I can trust him. That much is clear.
Then he drops a bomb on me.
“Sutton is my sister.”
“Oh.” That explains the I love you. I’ve spent the last few hours planning exactly what I would say to him the next time I saw him. I didn’t prepare for the possibility he’d have a reasonable explanation.
“You did remember that I have a sister, right?” he asks, a smirk tugging up the corners of his mouth.
He’s got me cornered—physically, emotionally—and he knows it.
“I thought you didn’t know where she was,” I say stupidly.
“I didn’t know where she was five years ago.”
“I guess you found her.” Suddenly, it seems I have a gift for stating the obvious. Sutton is his sister. That does make sense. But like so much of Sterling’s life, I don’t know much.
Sterling doesn’t seem to hold my newfound observational skills against me. “I did.”
It’s less that I forgot about his sister and more that, in the past, talking about her was like flipping his asshole switch. “I thought you didn’t want to find her.”
“I didn’t. She found me.”
“And why does she think I’m a bitch?” Sutton being his sister might clear up why he said I love you, but it doesn’t change how they seem to talk about me. I’d seen the message with my own eyes. Not only had she said it, he hadn’t corrected her.
“She’s not your number one fan,” he says, shifting away from the wall.
Now we’re getting somewhere. Somewhere uncomfortable for both of us, but where we need to go. “And why would that be?”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” he says. “About my life.”
No shit. Now who’s stating the obvious? “Enlighten me.”
“You’re unbelievable,” he says with a laugh that sounds anything but amused. “You read my messages, jump to conclusions, and then—”
“Jump to conclusions?” I repeat in disbelief. “What am I supposed to think about you saying I love you to another woman and it’s not like I was snooping. You gave me your phone.”
Now he looks cornered. Good. “I did give you my phone.”
“Don’t you dare paint me as some psychotic girlfriend who is nosing around in your business.” I poke his sternum with my index finger. That turns out to be a mistake because it’s like hitting a launch button.
“Aren’t you?” he storms. “You’re always sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”
“Because you won’t tell me anything!” I’m the unbelievable one? There are a lot of ways that he’s changed. There are a lots of ways that I’ve changed. But the lies and mystery he likes to keep as armor? It hasn’t changed.
“There’s nothing to tell.”
My jaw unhinges and I hastily close my mouth with a glare. If I started writing down all the things I don’t know about him, it would rival Santa’s Christmas list. All he does is keep secrets. It might even be what came between us before. I can’t be sure, because I don’t even know what that was!
“I think there’s a lot to tell. Like why she wants you to come home or why you said not this time,” I quote the text back to him.
“You memorized it?” His eyebrows raise.
I can’t tell what he thinks about that, except that I’m in real danger of actually being a psycho girlfriend despite my intentions.
“It’s kinda burned in my brain,” I say. “I mean, I fucked you thinking I could trust you, and then before I could put my panties back on, another woman was sending you texts.”
Sterling sucks in a deep breath and I’m not sure if he’s preparing for a shouting match or finding his zen. He releases it slowly, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “You can trust me, Adair.”
“Okay, prove it,” I challenge him. “Tell me how you made your money.”
I’m tired of being on the outside. I’m tired of looking at him and seeing as many questions as I do possibilities.
“I don’t see what this has to do with anything.” He shakes his head and I get the distinct impression he’s lying to himself as much as he is to me.
I watched a marriage built on lies. I lived it. There’s no way I’m settling for less than all of him, even if it means getting none of him. “It has everything to do with it. Where have you been the last five years? Why did you come back? I’m tired of only knowing half of your life. How do I know things are real between us?”
Sterling’s perfect eyes wince in pain. If it hurts him to be misunderstood, why doesn’t he make himself clear? I see the little muscles in his jaw twitch as he takes a step toward me. I back up reflexively, bumping into the wall. There’s nowhere to go.
“Lucky,” he tries to say it evenly, but his tone is a complete betrayal of the storm on our horizon.
Isn’t that how it’s always been with us? We crave the breeze that blows in while we ignore the blue-black thunderclouds. For us, it’s easier to pretend it’s not coming. We tell this lie. We believe it. We turn our backs to the wind. It’s what makes the squall impossible to overcome. The storm grabs hold before we can break free, capsizes us, drags us below the surface. We drown in each other. I’m tired of it. I want to sail into the storm—standing on the bow, back straight, head unbowed. I want to face what we are and see if I’m strong enough to survive the truth of it. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re beyond wrong.” His intensity is breathtaking and now it’s in his eyes: the hurricane I’m determined to face. That’s when I realize that he is my storm. He is the danger. I can either sail through him or turn back. There’s no other way to survive him. So why do I melt against the wall? Why do my eyes close, my lips part?
His hand flashes towards me and unties the knot of my robe. It falls open before I’ve processed his intentions. One impossibly strong arm reaches under my right, around my back, and grabs my upper left arm. His body presses me against the wall, his knee pins my legs apart.
“Does this feel real?” he says. I can sense how hard he is fighting to keep control of himself. It should frighten me. Instead, I feel the fabric of my panties soak. He holds me fast against the wall, waiting for my response.
I nod.
His mouth finds mine, desperate and hungry. Frantic to claim me. He takes my bottom lip into his mouth and nips down hard. The sharp metallic tang of iron floats across my tongue.